Los Angeles daily herald., 1887-08-29
FRIGID MARY ANDERSON.
How She Did Not Marry an Eng
lish Duke.
Brooklyn Citizen.

Brooklyn Citizen.
A woman who knows Mary Ander-
son we'll gave me a curious explana-
ton of l.er indifference to all suitors.
She says that when our Mary first ap-
peared in England several years ago,
and captured the heart of London,
among her earliest victims was a GER
tain young duke, and at that time not
of age. He was quite mad about her,
and though her step-father pursued
with him also his inflexible habit of
repression, and saw an advertise
ment in the snubbing of duke, the
ardent young nobleman managed to
convey some extremely passionate let
ters to her in the baskets of superb
flowers which he had handed over the
footlights almost nightly. The Ander-
son was half pleased and half fright
ened. The duke was even at that
time very attractive in appearance,
and his rank and immense wealth nat
urally did not detract from his
charms.
She had been carefully instructed
before leaving here, and had the
lesson dinned in her ears from Sandy
Hook to the Mersey, to turn a deaf
ear to the willy words of titled Brit
ishers, who were lordly villains, ever
one. She heard and needed, and
allowed her step-parents to ruthlessly
trample upon the ducal passion. The
old man himself was decidly provin-
cial, and he himself believed that all
English noblemen were as untrust-
worthy and immoral as he had taught
Mary. At that time the impulsive
young man would have married Mary
out of hand if he had not
been so badgered and suspected by
herself and her father, and If they had
been trif1e less difficult she would in
this present year Of our Lord be the
Duchess of -. By the time Miss
Anderson returned second time to
England she had gained sufficient
knowledge of the world to be aware of
this fact. and her manner to her
whilom suitor was far less austere,
but he, also, had been learning in the
meantime.
He had reached his majority, and
had had season in London, where
mothers with marriageable daughters
teach rich young man of rank his
full value. One little incident of that
first season of his is worth retailing.
The unmarried girls in London re-
volted that year against the grasping,
greedy man9uvres of the young ma
irons, who were not content with their
own prize. but were essaying to keep
the eligible bachelors dangling in their
train. This revolt took the form of
what was known as the Rosebud ball,
to which only one chaperone was
asked. Fifty young women OF wealth
and position gave the dance, each one
having the privilege of inviting five
persons. On the morning of the tenth
day before the ball took place the
young duke had bulky mail.
There were fifty invitations to the
Rosebud ball. Each one of the younger
women had sent four cards to her
friends, and each one secretly sent the
fifth to this most desirable young man.
There was Homeric laughter in Lon
don, and the nobleman whom the act
ress rejected found himself the chief
cornerstone of eligibility. He renewed
in chastened form, since which time,
though he has always been most civil
to her, he has not put himself in q po-
sition to be rejected. Some of his
friends, possibly Miss Anderson her.
self, believe that he has never really
cared for any other woman, and will
eventually ask her to be his wife, and
meantime she receives the advances
of all other men with cool sweetness
and refusal.